Admission of Solitude
by nosugarincoffee
Summary: Wounded Dantalion stays in William's room and mulls over his reasons and feelings. I've only seen the anime, so if there are any disrepancies regarding what was disclosed in manga, I apologise.


"I asked Swallow to change rooms with me for today," William said. "So lie down."

Dantalion, who made to rise from a lying position on William's bed, gratefully fell back onto the mattress.

"...thanks."

William sat down on the edge of the other bed and continued towelling his blonde hair, wet from a shower.

"No," he mumbled. "I should be the one saying that."

"A-anyway," he said then more loudly, cheeks flushed pale red and eyes avoiding Dantalion, "don't try doing anything weird during the night._ Absolutely_. You get it? Okay, I'll turn of the lights."

Dantalion chuckled surreptitiously when William climbed onto the bed, curled up and threw the blanket over himself in a gesture somewhat rebellious, forgetting Dantalion's night vision surpassed any human being by far and hardly differed from day. Or perhaps maintaining that human night vision was limited because their eyes lacked a tapetum lucidum.

Dantalion shook his head. His lips retained the shape of a smile.

_Is being thought of as human something to be happy about?_

He touched his fingertips to a gash across his left cheek that had missed the eye by a mere hair when inflicted. Another one had split the surface of his right thigh. Both had been sustained during a fight with a demon assuming the form of a giant barn owl, which had attacked William on his before-curfew prefect patrol around the school grounds.

Out of all, a barn owl. One that summons dreams of despair; or so was the belief Dantalion had never capable of freeing himself of.

Naturally, as a demon, he no longer dreamt.

But he could be reminded of the nightmare of reality his existence was.

_I wonder why it is._

With hands folded behind his head, he rolled onto his side, ignoring the pain of his injuries.

_Why do we put our everything on stake, face what we hate, willingly suffer pain just to protect the Elector, a mortal? "It's because only with his power we can succeed the throne of Hell"... But is it the title and might we seek? Or..._

_Do we just once more want to experience the kindness that saved us?_

_If by getting chosen as the Ruler of Hell I won't be able to remain in this world, how could I say I'd stay by your side forever?_

_You surely know that as long as they have abstract thinking, people can make decisions about something that doesn't really exist. Then it would be easier for you to see me as an illusion._

_And yet, I..._

_Why am I so desperate to convince you I'm real?_

Solitude. There was nothing but growing solitude, grabbing for his ankles like hands of a dying person, draping itself over his back like breath of death. Solitude encasing him in its mantle as the skin of his palms was smeared with darker and darker crimson.

And the rescuing touch, the words of understanding, the promise of liberation from the anguish; he tried to reach for them, tried to drown himself in them, to never perceive anything else anymore, but they were far, so far away –

He broke into a dash to at least brush his fingers against them, to at least preserve a single shard that wouldn't let him forget, but he stumbled and his balance was thrown off, and he was falling – falling –

"Dantalion!"

Vivid red like the colour his life had been painted with, his eyes snapped open.

He was gasping for his breath, centimetres from rolling off the bed in a silent, night-time room. Its wounds seared when he swung up, his features contorted. Dantalion uttered a low hiss.

"Dantalion?"

Only then did he take a notice of a voice calling his name; a voice unlike the one he had been chasing after, nevertheless a voice harbouring the exactly same sort of kindness yearned for. Dantalion turned his head to the right.

"William...?"

"What's happened?"

William's expression betrayed the uneasiness well masked in the question that gave the impression it had been asked out of formality.

"You were screaming in your sleep."

Dantalion exhaled and, almost as if in a dream, caressed William's jaw line with his fingers.

"What –"

Dantalion craned his neck upwards and kissed him.

"What are you doing?" William managed to get past his lips, utterly dazed. "Are you still half asleep?"

"William" Dantalion said quietly.

He was himself surprised at how pathetic the sound of his trembling voice was.

His hand rested on William's shoulders with the intention to pull him closer, but his strength had left him.

"Please," he whispered, unable to face William's eyes, afraid of what he might glimpse in them. "Please, William... let me believe I'm really here right now..."

His breath hitched in the back of his throat and his mouth latched onto William's neck, the pointed teeth scraping against the white skin.

"Nn..."

William's arms wound around his shoulders, as though attempting to find some kind of support.

"Why don't you try to stop me?" Dantalion muttered between two kisses on William's chest, having torn the fabric of his pyjamas with a motion of his hand. "You know it would be enough to say one words and I wouldn't be able to defy it..."

"Do you... aghn... want me to stop you?"

"There's no way I would want that. I just can't help wondering why..."

"It's because..."

William drew away a little and averted Dantalion's gaze.

"I'm scared," he said in a barely audible, shivering voice.

Dantalion took his hand and pressed his mouth against its back.

"Of what?"

"I thought... I'd be able to deny everything at first. But I've been close to getting killed so many times... I just can't take it anymore. Everything I took for granted and never doubted is crumbling. Sometimes the only thing I can believe is..."

As the sentence resumed, Dantalion, glued to the side of William's arm, opened his eyes and jerked in shock.

"...that you'll come to save me."

"William..."

Dantalion scooped him up from the chair where he'd been sitting and laid him onto the bed, then climbed onto him, propped on his knees and palms.

"This is reality... right? I'm here right now, isn't that so?"

William raised a hand and softly ran his fingertips over the cut on Dantalion's cheek. The demon groaned lowly.

"...yeah."

Dantalion dove for another deep kiss. Tentatively and clumsily, William responded.

"I'll make it so that it won't hurt you."

"Are you seriously using illusions in this situation? Are you an idi- ah!"

"Using my powers for your sake makes me the happiest," Dantalion said with a smile as he lightly rubbed William's cock, the realist for once losing his retorts in favour of gasps and moans.

"Sensitive, aren't you?"

Dantalion ran his tongue over the outline of William's ear shell.

"Did you think I- ahn! have, ngh, demons do this to- ahh! me on daily basis?"

"I do hope you don't."

Dantalion's finger slipped inside him, and William cried out.

"Won't you say it for me, William?" Dantalion said while moving it in and out, then adding a second. "That it's only me..."

"You, anh... pervert of a demon – ungh!"

William let out a loud whimper in response to Dantalion's grip on the base of his cock.

"Well?"

Dantalion thrust the fingers deeper.

"Aahn!"

He removed them completely, causing another whine to escape the blond.

"You're the only one, Dantalion," he said, his voice having lost its haughtiness and gained an edge of lewdness. "You're the only one... AH!"

"Thank you," Dantalion murmured, showering William's skin with kisses and several tears as he pushed into him. He slid his arms under William's body and held him close, whispered his name over and over, trying to convey his gratitude, loneliness and preciousness William's being meant for him in the three syllables and accelerating movements. William answered him with his nails breaking Dantalion's skin and digging deeper than any wound ever could, with his body shifting to accommodate him, with the intermittent fragments of his, Dantalion's, name mingled with his cries and gasps.

"Nnh... William..." Dantalion moaned through clenched teeth, tightening his embrace."

"Aahn! Danta... nngh! lion..."

William's body, out of its owner's command, surrendered to Dantalion's arms.

"Don't go," he mumbled indistinctly.

"I won't." Dantalion gently kissed his forehead. "I've told you I'm bound to you for eternity."

"Scientifically... eternity doesn't exist... everything's subject to... deterioration and..."

"Sure, sure. Isn't it a nice imagination, though?"

Whether William's "mm" was an intentional reply or a start of sleep-talk, Dantalion was certain he heard it.


End file.
